This Too Shall Pass — But Will You?

“Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response.”

— Viktor E. Frankl

The Pressure Cooker Moment

It always begins the same way. You are running late. A glass falls and shatters. Someone makes a comment that lands too close to the bone. Suddenly, your voice is louder, your chest is tighter, and your breath is quicker than you remember allowing. You say things you don’t mean, sharp, loaded, final. You slam doors, roll your eyes, and scoff.

And just like that, a spoon on the ground becomes the spark for war. The air shifts. What began as inconvenience turns into indignation. You are no longer arguing about the spoon. You are yelling about everything, your exhaustion, your unmet expectations, your aching pride. It’s not about now. It’s about everything you have swallowed for weeks.

In that moment, everything feels enormous, so final, so personal. You swear everyone is against you. You feel haunted.

But, what if it’s not?

When Everything Feels Bigger Than It Is

We have all lived in that moment, the one where the world narrows to the heat in your face, the tightness in your jaw, and the illusion that this, right now, is everything. When the missed text, the misplaced keys, the way they chewed their food, becomes unbearable.

Stress magnifies life through a funhouse mirror. We yell at the children because of the email that went unanswered. We slam drawers because of the fear we have been carrying for weeks. The anger comes out sideways, and suddenly everyone around us is walking on eggshells.

What we forget in the heat of it all is something painfully simple: this too shall pass.

The Magnifying Glass of Pain

There is a strange thing pain does: it amplifies. It turns whispers into insults, accidents into attacks, and delays into betrayals. It makes you the center of a drama you never auditioned for.

“Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains.”

— C.S. Lewis

When we are hurting, tired, stretched thin, misunderstood, we don’t just feel pain. We become it. We carry it into every room. Every sentence. Every silence. We speak through it, even when we think we are being reasonable. We see through it, even when the picture is clear.

And we forget: This storm will pass. But the things we say in the middle of it? They may not.

The Family and the Frozen House

Six years ago, I met a family bound by blood, torn apart and divided by land. Their father had passed away, leaving behind a modest home and a sliver of land. Nothing extravagant. But grief has a way of lighting fires where love once lived. One house. Three siblings. And a quiet war.

The house still stands. Half-painted. Abandoned.

The eldest brother, Emmanuel, was methodical, meticulous, and deeply loyal to his father’s legacy. He believed he had done the right thing by securing the title in his name, “for safekeeping,” he said. The younger brother, Samuel, saw it differently: as betrayal. As theft. And the only daughter, Grace, was stuck in the middle, carrying the weight of neutrality, perhaps out of fatigue, perhaps out of wisdom.

By the time I visited, the walls of that house were lined with silence. Lawsuits had been filed. Insults had hardened into belief. They barely looked at each other.

The house was stuck in time. A calendar still hung on the wall, frozen on a month three years past. I remember the smell of dust, the plastic covering on the couch, still untouched. It was a house held hostage by history. A missed call was seen as manipulation. A delay in sharing documents was treated as sabotage.

It wasn’t about the land anymore. It was about trust. Identity. Control.

During a tense afternoon, I asked the question no one dared voice: “What would your father think if he walked in today?”

The room didn’t erupt. It wilted.

Emmanuel looked at the ground. Samuel’s eyes narrowed, then softened. Grace quietly left to the kitchen, where she pretended to be busy but never returned.

A year later, the legal battle was dismissed. Clerical errors. Missing documents. No one got the house. No one got the land. What they did get, though, was the ghost of what once was. No one could sell. No one could build. The land was frozen. So were their relationships.

Grace called me months after. Her voice carried the hollow ring of regret.

“We wasted six years,” she said. “And for what? I don’t even remember why we started fighting.“

The storm had passed. But the wreckage stayed.

Also read: When the Ones Who Hurt Us Become the Ones We Pray For

The Cost of the Now

“What fools we mortals be, to quarrel over trifles and wound for eternity.”

— Unknown

We often think the problem is what’s in front of us. The land. The argument. The opportunity. But more often, it’s the ego behind it, whispering, “You will lose if you don’t fight.”

So we fight. We betray friends. We shut down conversations. We poison the room to win the moment. We lose relationships over emails. We end marriages over tempers. We scar children with words said on tired tongues.

And years later? We look back. And all we see is shame.

That car you lied to get. That job you pushed someone else aside to grab. That knowledge you hoarded instead of sharing. And now? It doesn’t even matter.

You are not proud of the win. You are haunted by the cost.

“In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.”

— Albert Camus

But to find that summer, we have to pause. We have to ask: Is this really what I want to be remembered for?

What Storm Are You In Right Now?

Somewhere in your life, there is a storm. Maybe it’s loud. Maybe it’s quiet. Maybe it’s wearing the face of someone you love.

Pause. Step back. Ask yourself:

• Is this really the battle I want to be remembered for?

• Will this matter in 48 hours?

• Is my reaction aligned with the person I am becoming?

The storm may be raging. But it won’t last forever.

“It is not the load that breaks you down, but the way you carry it.”

— Lena Horne

Your Legacy Is in the Pause

The house still stands. Untouched. Overgrown. A half-painted house slowly reclaimed by weather and time. But no one lives in it.

That, too, is a metaphor.

Emmanuel moved to another town. Samuel started therapy. Grace sometimes visits, though never for long. The family still exists, but only barely, in fragments, in memory.

We are often so focused on winning the fight that we forget we are burning down the home.

Pause. Breathe. Reassess. Before you speak, before you sever. Because the storm will pass, but the wound you cause may not. And years from now, when you stand in the ruins, will you say, “It was worth it”. Or will you whisper, “What have I done?”

Final Reflection

The real power lies not in stopping the storm, but in choosing who you remain inside it.

This, too, shall pass, yes. But before it does, ask yourself:

Will the person I became in this storm be worth remembering?

So if you need one sentence to carry with you today, let it be this:

“This too shall pass. But let me not pass with it.”

Journaling Prompt: Before the Storm Returns

Think of a time when you let the pressure of the moment shape your reaction more than the truth of the situation. What was at stake? How did it affect others, and how did it affect you afterward? What would you do differently now, knowing this, too, shall pass?

And if this story resonated with you, share it. Tell someone. And if you want more stories that open your heart, deepen your vision, and guide your growth, subscribe to Ascent to Virtue. We are all walking each other home.

Dr. Hélène